Cultural Approaches to Studying Religion

Revisiting scriptures: Unbinding a critical comparative subfield

“…However I think the troubling of religion as a category is illustrative of what Sarah Bloesch and M. Cooper Minister (2019) frame as the “complex understanding of religion” necessary for understanding “why we tend to identify religion as present in some places…but do not see religion manifesting in other instances.” Making theoretical and methodological space for this complexity “challenge[s] understandings of the world as neatly divided into secular and religious spheres” (p. 2). Thus Richard Newton and Vaia Touna proffer an order of criticism that moves beyond simply “endorsing” or “dismiss[ing]” theoretical positions.…”